No Pa. Tax Break for Comcast

The state legislature closed its two-year session Monday without approving tax breaks sought by the MSO to move its headquarters into a new skyscraper in downtown Philadelphia, AP reported.

Comcast had promised of thousands of new jobs at the new building, owned by Liberty Property Trust, but opponents -- including Republican lawmakers and major office landlords in Philadelphia -- said the country's largest cable company didn’t deserve a government handout, according to AP.

"Companies have to pay their freight," Dave Campoli, president of the Center City Owners Association, a group of major office landlords in Philadelphia that fought the proposal, told AP.

And Steve Miskin, spokesman for House Majority Leader Sam Smith, told AP House Republicans refused to give "14 years of tax-free living to one of the largest companies in the country.”

Comcast has said in the past that it would not be as willing to expand its corporate operations in Pennsylvania without the tax breaks, although the company has never threatened to leave the city.

"Comcast is very disappointed by the failure of the General Assembly to enact the carefully structured economic-development legislation that would have locked in for Pennsylvania the significant future headquarters-job growth for Comcast," spokeswoman D'Arcy Rudnay said in a prepared statement.